Baseball and Economic Philosophy

Baseball is always idealized as being about soft values like family, fun, sunny days in June, and the rebirth of spring. You know what I'm talking about. You sit down to watch a game on television and the opening music plays with shots of youngters in awe with ice cream smeared all over their face. This is supposed to be baseball.

Behind all of these fluffy images are people, people performing a job. Baseball my dear readers, is a business (insert sarcastic gasps here). One aspect of the business of baseball that I never understood is the Rule V Draft which takes place well under the radar each December. The low key baseball fan and certainly not the kid with ice cream on his face understand this method of player aquisition. The truth however is that this one event can make or break a team. Johan Santana and Roberto Clemente are the most well known Rule V picks, hell they might be one of the best picks anywhere. Johan or not, many good players have come from the Rule V draft. So, what is it?

Basically, according to Baseball-Reference.com a player is eligible for the Rule V draft if he meets any of the following criteria:

1. He isn't on a MLB 40 man roster
2. He has been in the minors at least 4 years if signed or drafted after age 19.
3. He has been in the minors at least 5 years if signed or drafted before 19.

Upon being drafted, the club that has drafted the player has to keep him on the Major League Roster all season. Before they can send him to the Minor Leagues he has to be offered back to his previous organization.

Minor League clubs can also participate in the Rule V Draft with AAA teams able to pick AA players and AA teams able to pick A ball players. Here they don't have to be offered back.

Right now many of you are saying to yourselves...huh? Don't worry, me to.

The Rule V draft is a glaring example of how baseball is ironically counter-intuitive to America's other national pastime, capitalism. It is a tool used to create balance for your competitors and opportunity for players. I like it for these reasons but find it humorous in many ways.

In these times of financial crisis you hear a lot of discussion and debate over governmental bailouts. Throughout the presidential campaign I heard screams about Barack Obama being a socialist, as if it were a swear word. Yet there, resting in the friendly confines of America's most beloved of sports is Socialism. Let me break it down for you.

Socialism defined: (more or less, obviousley this is up for some debate)

1. a theory or system of social organization that advocates the vesting of the ownership and control of the means of production and distribution, of capital, land, etc., in the community as a whole.
2. procedure or practice in accordance with this theory.
3. (in Marxist theory) the stage following capitalism in the transition of a society to communism, characterized by the imperfect implementation of collectivist principles.

Based on these definitions the recent government bailouts are possibley acts of socialism, but this doesn't make the U.S. a socialist country. I live in Norway, a country which claims to be a social democracy. This doesn't mean my paycheck is put into a big pot and distributed amongst everyone. Actually, my taxes here are comparable if not lower than many Americans. The point here being that socialism, capitalism, communism whatever, are not definitive terms. They are measured in degrees. So Norway is probably more socialist than the U.S. but it isn't 100% socialist (stay tuned for cries from Marxist supporters please).

Back to baseball....I don't have a problem with socialism. Nor do I have a problem with leveling the playing field in small ways for other teams we play against. It's actions like these that seemingly make it so the Yankees don't buy everything.

From an international perspective however, less socialism would serve the game better. In addition to things such as the Rule V draft, revenue sharing, and uniform minor league contracts the means in which MLB organizes itself is like a corporation with 30 board members. The contradiction is that the 30 board members compete against one another making it stifling for innovation and expansion. This would let the game grow as clubs would seek to expand their market appeal more aggressively than they are now. This would mean academies all over the world, partnership with foreign companies, and games being played outside the North American continent.

On a lighter note; Happy Birthday to Wayne Garrett who was born on this day in 1947.